February 10, 201115 yr 2 part question 1. What is the biggest UFC fight to date? Regardless of how the fight turned out or where the two fighters went after. 2. What is the best UFC fight to date? Factor in entertainment, importance and quality of fighters.
February 10, 201115 yr Glad you differentiated the two questions because what I had in mind in the Anderson Silva thread could have basically went these two ways, so I am glad you differentiated. The biggest thing I wanted to stress is that on paper the upcoming Sila/GSP fight will be the biggest fight to ever hit the octagon, barring a Jake Shields win, or some kind of Mayweather/Pacquio shenanigans that I don't think will happen. GSP has obviously signed off on this, as well as Silva so it looks like it will be going down later in the year. Already mentioned why I feel this would be the biggest fight to date in the other thread so not going to reiterate on that, but I will follow with the thread and throw some past fights out there. When you think of hyped UFC fights you have to immediately start thinking about some of the Chuck Liddel/Tito Ortiz fights. Seemed like Chuck was always a big draw though because his fights with Couture were the same way, not to mention the crazy hype that went into his fights with Wanderlei and Rampage. Had Chuck and Wandy not both been coming off back to back losses before their fight I think that would have been without a doubt the biggest UFC fight so far to this date. That's a lot of what if though, but still think about it, imagine if Wandy finishes his PRIDE career with wins over Henderson and Cro Cop then comes into the UFC to fight Liddel for the LH title, that would have blew the top off of what was already an incredibly huge fight. Not to mention Chuck was following up from losing his title to Rampage and then losing to Keith Jardine. The Heavyweight division has always carried some hugely anticipated fights. Couture/Sylvia, Sylvia/Arlovski then recently Lesnar/Carwin and Lesnar/Cain were both looked to be pretty huge as well. UFC 100 as a whole was pumped pretty hard, but I guess it doesn't consider one fight that was perceived as the best fight that had ever been drawn up. A few others I think that could bring some looks would be maybe BJ Penn versus GSP or BJ/Matt Hughes. This kind of sticking with the Anderson Silva/GSP concept, two great champions from different weight classes going to war, very easy to hype those types of fights. To round some out that would be in the discussion and I guess top 10 possibilities you could throw out there Couture/Belfort III, Frank Trigg/Matt Hughes II, or one of the Tito/Shamrock fights which were all huge fights back in the day. Then lastly I guess you could say GSP/Serra II could go in there somewhere because at the time was a very big draw because everyone wanted to see what GSP would do to bounce back.
February 10, 201115 yr That's just some off the top of my head that would be in discussion, not sure which way you could go for the best hyped/most anticipated fight of all time. I'll answer the second part of the thread question later.
February 10, 201115 yr Biggest fight has to be TUF 1 finale between Forrest and Bonner, iMO. It brought the UFC to the consciousness of folks that were not big mma fans, including yours truly. The best fight I have seen was Guida vs. Diego Sanchez. If you have not seen this one, please do yourself the favor of watching it. AWESOME!!!
February 10, 201115 yr Now for Part II of the question. Best fights of the UFC as far as being just great fights. Griffin/Bonnar TUF 1, Guida/Sanchez, Liddel/Silva, Hughes/Trigg II (nut gate), Liddel/Couture II, Couture/Sylvia, Gracie/Kimo or Gracie Severn, Penn/GSP, Hughes/GSP II, Pete Sell/Scott Smith. I could go on and on and on but to meet your criteria these were some excellent fights as far as just being very entertaining fights. Best fight I have ever saw though was in the WEC between Leonard Garcia and the Korean Zombie, wow, is all I can say about that one. Hands down best of all time.
February 10, 201115 yr Couture vs. Liddell I I loved that fight. I'd say the fight that has had the most impact on MMA as a sport was Griffin/Bonnar.
February 10, 201115 yr If you go by money at the gate and PPV buys it was one of the Liddell/Ortiz fights that was the biggest but not sure which one. Bonnar/Griffin was the most important fight but dont think it was the biggest or the best. At the time Lesnar/Couture was marketed as the biggest fight in UFC history and im sure those numbers were really big. But then I think Lesnar/Carwin and Lesnar/Velasquez was also marketed as the biggest fight in UFC history and they may have been. My favorite fight might be the Liddell/Wand slugfest.
February 10, 201115 yr As far as biggest pay-per-view fights go, I'd go between Couture vs. Sylvia and GSP vs. B.J. Penn (2nd fight). The event that made the UFC what it is has to go to TUF finale between Griffin and Bonnar; it has went nowhere but up since. If GSP and Silva fights, that will be the most watched UFC/MMA fight ever and wouldn't be surprised at all if it also breaks some of the big pay-per-view boxing sales revenues from back when boxing was much better overall.
February 10, 201115 yr Now for Part II of the question. Best fights of the UFC as far as being just great fights. Griffin/Bonnar TUF 1, Guida/Sanchez, Liddel/Silva, Hughes/Trigg II (nut gate), Liddel/Couture II, Couture/Sylvia, Gracie/Kimo or Gracie Severn, Penn/GSP, Hughes/GSP II, Pete Sell/Scott Smith. I could go on and on and on but to meet your criteria these were some excellent fights as far as just being very entertaining fights. Best fight I have ever saw though was in the WEC between Leonard Garcia and the Korean Zombie, wow, is all I can say about that one. Hands down best of all time. :thumb:
February 10, 201115 yr Found this and thought it is interesting information for this thread: Top 10 PPV buy rates, 2010 1. Boxing: Floyd Mayweather vs. Shane Mosley, May 1, 1.4 million buys 2. Boxing: Manny Pacquiao vs. Antonio Margarito, Nov. 13, 1,150,000 buys 3. UFC 116: Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin, July 3, 1,100,000 buys 4. UFC 114: Quinton Jackson vs. Rashad Evans, May 29, 1,050,000 buys 5. UFC 121: Lesnar vs. Cain Velasquez, Oct. 23, 1,000,000 buys 6. UFC 124: Georges St. Pierre vs. Josh Koscheck, Dec. 11, 785,000 buys 7. UFC 111: St. Pierre vs. Dan Hardy, March 27, 770,000 buys 8. Boxing: Manny Pacquiao vs. Joshua Clottey, March 13, 700,000 buys 9. UFC 107: Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen, Aug. 7, 600,000 buys 10. UFC 118: Frank Edgar vs. B.J. Penn/Randy Couture vs. James Toney, 535,000 buys
February 10, 201115 yr Strictly in #'s I'm not sure if GSP vs. Silva can be the "biggest fight". I'm not saying no just yet, but, I think it has two very big setbacks. 1. Neither of the two are known very well outside of MMA circles. And honestly, I think Rampage and Lesnar are really the only two current UFC fighters you can say are universally known. Four of the top 6 UFC PPV Buys (including #1) feature Brock Lesnar at the top of the card. 2. Neither fighter is a U.S. citizen and both have a heavy accent when speaking English. Let's face facts, those are two big detterents in popularity. Edited February 10, 201115 yr by formerkywrestler
February 10, 201115 yr Strictly in #'s I'm not sure if GSP vs. Silva can be the "biggest fight". I'm not saying no just yet, but, I think it has two very big setbacks. 1. Neither of the two are known very well outside of MMA circles. And honestly, I think Rampage and Lesnar are really the only two current UFC fighters you can say are universally known. Four of the top 6 UFC PPV Buys (including #1) feature Brock Lesnar at the top of the card. 2. Neither fighter is a U.S. citizen and both have a heavy accent when speaking English. Let's face facts, those are two big detterents in popularity. As far as being significant to MMA and to the UFC though there is no way around it. This is going to be the biggest UFC fight to date, it is the definition of a super fight. I get what your saying and from a PPV buy standpoint and non MMA fan standpoint your reasoning is very valid. However, in terms of MMA, this is "the fight".
February 10, 201115 yr As far as being significant to MMA and to the UFC though there is no way around it. This is going to be the biggest UFC fight to date, it is the definition of a super fight. I get what your saying and from a PPV buy standpoint and non MMA fan standpoint your reasoning is very valid. However, in terms of MMA, this is "the fight". If you are talking about significance to MMA fans then I'd say you are right. But I would probably argue that in terms of significance to the UFC, a Brock fight probably did more for them than this fight will. This is a fight for people who are already big MMA fans. Brock on the other hand did a LOT more than this fight can for the UFC, because it "really" introduced MMA and more so the UFC to a large contigent of people who weren't otherwise fans.
February 10, 201115 yr Couture vs. Liddell I I loved that fight. I'd say the fight that has had the most impact on MMA as a sport was Griffin/Bonnar. I agree. I loved Couture/Liddell I. Definitely near the top of my list. I think the Griffin/Bonnar fight could be the answer to both questions. I've seen some other great fights, and some that I might have liked better because of the participants, but that fight was as good as any I've seen. I don't think there's any doubt about the impact it has had.
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